S04.E01: 3 Seventeen Year Olds

[thewhiteowl]

Hondo, his father Daniel Sr. and his teen charge Darryl confront the history of racial tension in Los Angeles between law enforcement and the Black community, through flashbacks to the city in 1992 following the Rodney King verdict. Also, the SWAT team pursues El Diablo’s scattered drug cartel hiding in the city and a Jihadist group detonating bombs in coordinated attacks.

[Raja]

Flashbacks to the Rodney King riots, a drug kingpin with a tank and a terrorist cell taken down and there were still 30 minutes left.  A quick line about the early days of COVID before mask were recommended to get the actors faces on screen yet a mask wearing demonstration is shown in a trying to have your cake and eat it too moment.

[DanaK]

It was a fairly emotional hour. It seems that Hondo's dad has now given up on trying to affect change. I think this episode was still in script stage last season when they had to shut down; I don't believe it had been filmed yet. Either way, it was probably fairly easy to rejigger the present scenes a bit to include pandemic stuff.

[UnoAgain]

Listening to George Floyd's words were a gut punch... As was Obba Babatunde's last few scenes.  

[Danielg342]

The case was...blah. So I won't talk about that.

The race issues were well done. They drove the point home without overdoing it and fairly balanced the rosy perspective of Hondo Junior and the cynical perspective of Hondo Senior. It showed there are no easy solutions to the problem, if one even exists.

Only one minor nitpick- I know Darryl wasn't alive when Rodney King was beaten, but I'd think he might have come across the name. It was a pretty big event in Los Angeles, so him not even knowing it happened seems off to me. He might not know the details, but King- who only died in 2012- should have been on his radar.

[WinJet0819]

13 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

The case was...blah. So I won't talk about that.

The race issues were well done. They drove the point home without overdoing it and fairly balanced the rosy perspective of Hondo Junior and the cynical perspective of Hondo Senior. It showed there are no easy solutions to the problem, if one even exists.

Only one minor nitpick- I know Darryl wasn't alive when Rodney King was beaten, but I'd think he might have come across the name. It was a pretty big event in Los Angeles, so him not even knowing it happened seems off to me. He might not know the details, but King- who only died in 2012- should have been on his radar.

Completely agree. And considering he's grown up in LA, it's just about impossible that he wouldn't hear about it in some fashion. If he's heard about the 92 LA Riots, then you'd expect he'd know what event precipitated the 92 LA Riots.

[kirkola]

16 hours ago, Danielg342 said:

The case was...blah. So I won't talk about that.

The race issues were well done. They drove the point home without overdoing it and fairly balanced the rosy perspective of Hondo Junior and the cynical perspective of Hondo Senior. It showed there are no easy solutions to the problem, if one even exists.

Only one minor nitpick- I know Darryl wasn't alive when Rodney King was beaten, but I'd think he might have come across the name. It was a pretty big event in Los Angeles, so him not even knowing it happened seems off to me. He might not know the details, but King- who only died in 2012- should have been on his radar.

Rodney King and the LA Riots were one of the major "where were you when" moments of the 1990s.  Not something easily forgotten, especially if you were raised in LA.  However, I think the writers had written themselves into a corner with this one.  Addressing the riots, required them to need a character to say "what was that" to give Hondo a reason to give a speech and the flashback scenes.  Given the limited actor pool they probably had to work with, the task got left to Darryl.  Without the pandemic, they could have written a different scene where maybe Hondo was speaking to elementary school kids.  So I think they made the best of a bad situation.

[Raja]

1 hour ago, kirkola said:

Rodney King and the LA Riots were one of the major "where were you when" moments of the 1990s.  Not something easily forgotten, especially if you were raised in LA.  However, I think the writers had written themselves into a corner with this one.  Addressing the riots, required them to need a character to say "what was that" to give Hondo a reason to give a speech and the flashback scenes.  Given the limited actor pool they probably had to work with, the task got left to Darryl.  Without the pandemic, they could have written a different scene where maybe Hondo was speaking to elementary school kids.  So I think they made the best of a bad situation.

They did have the anniversary commemoration scene. But Hondo coming with a me and Pops were among those few to save a light skinned person that first day would have come off as cheesy. In the how time has passed moment  only Deacon and Hondo could really remember what was going on back in the day 

[Danielg342]

16 hours ago, kirkola said:

Rodney King and the LA Riots were one of the major "where were you when" moments of the 1990s.  Not something easily forgotten, especially if you were raised in LA.  However, I think the writers had written themselves into a corner with this one.  Addressing the riots, required them to need a character to say "what was that" to give Hondo a reason to give a speech and the flashback scenes.  Given the limited actor pool they probably had to work with, the task got left to Darryl.  Without the pandemic, they could have written a different scene where maybe Hondo was speaking to elementary school kids.  So I think they made the best of a bad situation.

My guess is that without the pandemic, that scene takes place at Nichelle's community centre and ends with Hondo talking to Nichelle about ditching her the other night, instead of what we did get in S04E02.

As for Darryl, they could have had him ask for clarification about what happened to King (because, at most, he would have only read a Wikipedia article or a blog post about him) and what Hondo Senior's and Junior's experiences during the Riots were like. In other words, Darryl could have started the exposition while Junior and Senior clarify it and fill it in.

[TimetoShine]

On 11/12/2020 at 10:13 AM, UnoAgain said:

Listening to George Floyd's words were a gut punch... As was Obba Babatunde's last few scenes.  

As soon as I realized, I started bawling. I still can't believe what happened to him.